The Denison University Art Gallery presents three exhibits that all explore types of iconic images and objects, but in vastly different ways. "Collecting Cultures: Selections from the Denison University Permanent Collection," will share gallery space with Jude Tallichet's "There's Honey on the Moon" and Matthew Freedman's "ACME, ACME."

All three exhibits will run from Friday (March 2) until April 6.(The gallery will be closed for Denison's spring break from March 10th through the 18th.)There will be a closing reception for the exhibits from 6 to 8 p.m. on Friday, April 6, in the Burke Gallery. The gallery is open from 1 to 4 p.m. daily.

"Collecting Cultures" features objects from Denison's sizeable permanent collection of non-Western, particularly Burmese, art. The exhibit presents objects collected primarily from Burma, the San Blas Native Americans of Panama, and China. The exhibit's first three sections, "Moment of Contact," "Cultural Loss/Cultural Exchange," and "Tourist Art," reflect the evolving impact of the Western presence, particularly that of Western missionaries, on the artwork of non-Western cultures. The final section highlights the lives of the missionaries who collected and then donated the objects.

Besides providing a critique of the ways in which the Western presence changed traditional artistic subjects in the Colonial Era, "Collecting Cultures" also shows the creativity of non-Western artists when confronted with new patrons and cultural influences. By putting these objects in the context of the missionary encounter as well as that of their original cultures, the exhibit aims to show how objects with a meaning or significance in their original culture change meanings when they become personal collected objects.

"Collecting Cultures" and its corresponding web catalogue were prepared by Kimberly Masteller, a former Denison assistant professor, in collaboration with Eliza Kent and with students in Masteller's art history class.

Tallichet, a New York-based artist and musician, has created dozens of installations that have been described as "musical architectural." They combine replicas of buildings with sound and music that she often performs herself. Her latest installation, "There's Honey on the Moon," tackles one of the most well-known and iconic structures in the country - a double replica of the Empire State Building constructed out of plexiglass and standing 11 feet high.

Tallichet uses insistent dance music that plays through speakers in the structure, as well as a flirtatious exchange of voices set over the music to explore the various nostalgic associations the prominent structure conjures in the viewer. The installation conveys both the grandeur of the tall structure once a symbol of industrial success and innovation, and also the romantic associations which the building developed in popular film. Tallichet exhibited at the Denison University Art Gallery in 1991.

Freedman, a lecturer and senior critic of sculpture at the University of Pennsylvania, also previously exhibited at Denison in 1991. In stark contrast to his last exhibit in the Denison Gallery (which displayed cartoon-like figures mounted individually, creating small, defined universes), Freedman's latest installation, "ACME ACME," seems to defy boundaries. Enveloping the room in a 150-foot painting, Freedman hopes to overwhelm the viewer with continuous images in all directions. The painting is a compilation of 15 landscapes derived from old Warner Bros. cartoons blended together, on such a large scale that the characters seem to fly through space across walls and also out into the room by way of sculptures added to the painting.

About Denison:

Denison University, founded in 1831, is an independent, residential liberal arts institution located in Granville, Ohio. A highly selective college enrolling 2,100 full-time undergraduate students from all 50 states and dozens of foreign countries, Denison is a place where innovative faculty and motivated students collaborate in rigorous scholarship, civic engagement and the cultivation of independent thinking.

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